Hilton Head property owners challenge DHEC

COLUMBIA -- Some Hilton Head Island property owners may pay more for flood insurance and have less of a right to rebuild after a storm, if their properties are found to be out of compliance with the state environmental agency's new beachfront jurisdictional lines and erosion rates.

The town of Hilton Head and 17 private property owners are challenging the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control's 2009 lines and hope the agency board will reconsider them.

In a letter dated Aug. 26 to DHEC officials, the town's attorney argues that the agency's Ocean & Coastal Resource Management staff was wrong to use a shoreline map from the 1850's to calculate erosion rates and setback lines. Instead, states the attorney, the agency should have used data from the past 40 years and factored in the town's beach renourishment projects.

"In my opinion the 1859 shoreline survey included in the shoreline data set used to establish shoreline change rates for the 2009 setback line should not be used to quantify long-term shoreline change conditions along Hilton Head Island," writes Christopher Creed, a coastal and ocean engineer for a Jacksonville, Fla., firm, in an affidavit signed Aug. 24 and submitted to DHEC.

"There is not sufficient information regarding the circumstances under which the 1859 survey was collected to verify the accuracy and applicability ... ." If the DHEC board votes to grant a final review conference to the town of Hilton Head and any of the other petitioners, a hearing will be held to allow the property owners to lay out their complaints and the agency staff to defend its findings. The Thursday board meeting, however, was cancelled and no rescheduled date was announced on Wednesday afternoon.

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The article talks of a law that seems logical to bring current building codes into compliance. It has been around a long time for owners of older homes that in case of loss like afire, has to rebuild according to new codes. Sometimes wrecking the old home is cheaper.

So now in order to meet new shoreline codes, a home on the wrong side of the arbitrary line cannot be rebuilt in case of a loss. The owner not only loses the home, but still owns the lot and pays taxes on it, but cannot use it to rebuild a home. Stuck between a rock and a hard place.

So what compromise can be made to enforce the law and not punish the homeowner who has lost their home and cannot rebuild.

One way is to enforce the law, but set up a fund to help compensate the owners for loss of their property rights. A fixed amount could be determined ahead of time for all waterfront lots that disregards the property values. This would keep the courts out of the equation and speed up the settlement. The county would own the lot afterwards.

Of course the owner could allow the lots to go into tax forfeiture, which means the county would end up with the lot anyway on its forfeited property list. Not likely anyone would bid on the lot that they couldn't build on. Of course someone might bid just to have it. You could put a camping trailer on it if the zoning allowed it.

The owner could also donate it to a conservancy or to the county and receive a whopping tax benefit. Of course the amount would be determined by an appraisal.

I recall a guy asking me for advice about a lot on Fripp Island that was once above sea level , but is now covered by the ocean. The lot was on the forfeited land sale and he was considering bidding on it. I suggested that it would be a waste of money, since it was unusable, but the county would still charge him taxes for a lot that is underwater. Duh! A no brainer, since it would not likely become above sea level in maybe a million years, if then.